


The Rise and Fall of Tanner Harwell

by FallenShandeh



Category: Halo
Genre: Backstory, Canon Compliant, Gen, Gift Work, No Canon Characters Used, for non-AO3-member
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-09-29
Updated: 2014-09-29
Packaged: 2018-02-19 06:17:44
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,086
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2377922
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/FallenShandeh/pseuds/FallenShandeh
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sixteen-year-old Cadet Harwell wakes to pitch black dead silence.</p><p>Inside the buildings of the Caesar Military Academy, this is unheard-of, and most certainly not a good sign.</p><p>What happens next prompts an illustrious military career, ending with a tragedy no one saw coming.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Rise and Fall of Tanner Harwell

_**16 SEPTEMBER 2538, 0200 HOURS** _

It was never this dark inside the Caesar Military Academy.

Or this quiet.

It was the silence that had woken sixteen-year-old Tanner Harwell. As he laced up his combat boots, other cadets stirred - roused, perhaps, by the cold, soundless blackness.

He slung his assault rifle over his back, holstered his pistol, and slipped his helmet on. As his HUD booted up, the built-in night vision systems activated, and the eleven other cadets who shared his dorm lit up bright green.

Ordinarily there would be spots in the walls that also lit up. Warm spots, from the network of electronics that kept everything running as it should. His night vision systems outlined the walls and the twelve vacant bunks, but the only bright blobs were human-shaped.

“Okay,” he muttered to himself, running through a mental checklist, “zero comms chatter, nothing in the way of an apparent chain of command, no drill instructors shouting at us to go back to bed…” He opened the TEAMBIO screen. “Team’s heart rates are elevated, indicating anxiety. Still no signs of combat, but it’s early yet...”

It was time to take charge.

“Alright, Delta Squad, form up on me! Move! CMA’s power is out and our backup generators aren’t working. Best case scenario, we’re powered down for maintenance we haven’t been told about. Worst case, we’re under attack. Protocol dictates we invoke Contingency: Foxtrot Tango Sierra. All personnel are to rally at Evacuation Point Alpha and await further orders.” His hands trembled and all he wanted to do was make a run for it, but hauling ass wasn’t an option. His squad needed him.

This fear made no sense. For all he knew, there was nothing wrong at all. The protocol for hostile action was to sound every alarm the Academy _had_ , organize the cadets, and mount a solid defense. The silence was deafening and quite frankly nearly as terrifying as the alarm drills they ran every couple of months.

Delta Squad was a bit of a mess, still half-asleep and only halfway trained. Tanner himself, though he was the squad leader, wasn’t even close to prepared for real combat. He’d barely started on the combat _drills_.

“Stay frosty,” Tanner told his squad, leveling his rifle. He shouldered through the door, remembering a second late that he was supposed to lead with his weapon when he entered a new room or rounded a corner.

Thankfully the Academy was a ghost town.

Wait. Thankfully? Tanner grimaced. The Academy that never slept was as silent as the grave. That was never a good thing.

“This is creepy,” his second-in-command, Cadet Amy Withers, complained.

“Shush,” he told her. He might have agreed with her, but that didn’t mean he would stand for needless chatter. There was no use in announcing themselves to the enemy if they were under attack.

“Sir-”

“Silence, Withers,” Tanner hissed, tempted to turn and glare at her.

The silence shattered with the _crash_ of breaking glass. Delta Squad dropped, having drilled so hard on situations like this that the reaction was instinctive.

“Delta Squad. UNSC personnel, respond!” Tanner barked into his comm unit. The silence across the comms was as deafening as the chaos outside. “I repeat, Delta Squad, awaiting orders. UNSC personnel, respond!”

Finally, someone answered. “Delta Squad, Sierra Zero-Zero-Two. Status?”

“Green, sir!” Tanner assumed that someone with his own callsign was ranked higher than himself. He wasn’t going to hope that the Sierra callsign made the guy a Spartan. That would be too much good luck for one bad night. “All present and accounted-for.”

“Good. Rally at Evac Point Alpha.”

“Roger that, on our way.”

 

\---

 

Silence fell across the battlefield. Tanner peeled his eyes away from the carnage just long enough to glance at Delta Squad’s savior. The guy was ridiculously tall and wearing olive green armor with only one identifying mark: S-002 painted on the chestplate.

“Status?” Sierra Zero-Zero-Two demanded for the second time tonight.

“Green, sir,” Tanner replied, a little subdued. “Two KIA, three WIA, seven good to go.”

The tall armored man removed his helmet and crouched to inspect one of Tanner’s fallen comrades. “You all fought well. Evac should be here in twenty.” He paused, ruffled his bright ginger hair with one hand, and then turned surprisingly gentle green eyes to Tanner’s face. “How old are you?”

“Sixteen, sir,” Tanner mumbled.

“Speak up, Cadet.”

“Sixteen, sir!”

“Younger than I thought…” It seemed as if the Spartan was thinking out loud. Tanner just had time to wonder if that was something most Spartans did when there was a noise and the Spartan whipped around. Suddenly, his expression hardened and he slipped his helmet back on. “Heads up, we’ve got company.”

Tanner and his squad dived back into the carnage without a single question or complaint. It wasn’t training. It wasn’t even a mission. This was survival.

 

\---

 

“Grunt squads dropping in behind! They’re trying to flank us!”

“Delta three, five and eight, cover six o’clock,” Tanner barked. “Nine, take three o’clock, and ten, take nine. Two and twelve, on me. Spartan, when’s our evac getting here?”

“Ten minutes, Cadet,” the Spartan replied calmly.

“Sir, we’re dropping like flies. There’re too many!”

“Hold position. Keep it together, soldier!”

He hadn’t trained for this. It was too much. Everything stank of blood and fear, and they couldn’t win this fight. Tanner could only pray that he and what was left of his squad could hold out until the evac shuttle arrived. Panic would be their downfall, and that already had its hooks deep within him. He couldn’t speak for his squad, but six of the eight still alive fired wildly, without aiming. Pretty solid evidence they couldn’t think well enough to remember the few combat drills they’d run through.

Tanner and Amy were the only two still able to fight smart.

Not a good sign.

“Tangos, ten o’clock!” Delta ten shouted. Tanner turned to support his squadmate.

Something hit his left shoulder, and something else hit low to the right of his ribcage, shattering the two lowest ribs. He felt like he’d been punched, except there were bloody holes in him where the projectiles had hit.

He’d never been shot before. It hurt less than he’d expected it would. Time slowed down and sped up all at once. He was hot and cold, dizzy and focused, disoriented and yet entirely aware of where he was and what was happening.

Someone big and green spun him around and threw him into the middle of the group of soldiers, taking his place in the formation. He just kept finding targets, firing over his squadmates’ heads.

 

Tanner opened his eyes to the inside of a Pelican dropship. He must have blacked out, he decided, trying to sit up. A pair of strong, armored hands stopped him.

“Stay still,” a young woman’s voice told him. “I’ve done what I can but you’re wounded and I just don’t have the equipment here to perform the surgery you need. Eli tells me you’re sixteen?”

He nodded, unsure if talking was a good idea or not.

“You stayed useful for five minutes after you took those hits. For a greenhorn, that’s impressive. Stay in the military, Cadet Harwell… we need more people like you.”

“Lin, let the boy sleep,” the Spartan from before admonished. Vaguely, Tanner realized that was Eli.

There was a pinch in the crook of his elbow and before long, he had no choice but to give in to the drowsiness that overtook him.

 

Wounded or not, all the cadets were to be looked over in the _UNSC Devastation_ ’s medical bay. Lin was going to be busy for an hour or two. Longer if the Surgeon General decided to allocate her a surgery.

Eli glanced from cadet to cadet. Six had survived. Another one might be lost, but even if that happened, this was still a victory in his eyes. The most that had ever been saved before, when other military academies were hit, was three.

Nobody spoke. Lin quietly checked on each cadet in turn, but didn’t expect them to say a word.

They needed that. Eli had seen their expressions before. These children needed time to process what had happened. He expected they would be taken to another military academy, where at least one would drop out, or worse, go mad from the post-traumatic stress. They hadn’t finished their training. That much was obvious. If not for the squad leader, Eli didn’t think even _he_ would have been able to save any. Harwell had a lot of potential. Lin was right; the boy _should_ stay in the military. There weren’t many who could keep such a cool head under so much pressure. Especially not with extremely minimal training.

 

\---

 

_**FIFTEEN YEARS LATER** _

“Captain Harwell, sir!”

Harwell looked up from the SMG that was in pieces on his desk, waiting to be cleaned. “Yes?”

“First Lieutenant Emmaline Romero reporting as ordered, sir!”

Romero was in charge of one of the best units in the company, and Harwell was very seriously considering promoting her. She would make an excellent second-in-command for the company. Better than the idiot he had to deal with _now_ , anyway.

Nineteen-year-old Romero had something the others didn’t. She was quiet, serious, and didn’t take any shit from anyone, but she also knew when to relax, be friendly, and just have _fun_. Everyone who served under her had enormous amounts of respect for her, and she knew her place in the chain of command. She had questioned orders _once_ , and then only because Harwell had been half-delirious with a fever when he had issued the order.

Harwell fully expected her to be the youngest Major the UNSC MPs had ever seen. And she could, and probably would, go farther.

“I have a mission for you, Romero. Not your unit; you personally. You will select one man or woman from your unit to act as your partner in this investigation. I suggest choosing someone who can lend an experienced eye.” He paused, picked up one piece of his SMG, and started cleaning it. “I’m assigning you to the _UNSC Spire of Darkness_ for twelve months. There have been rumors of misbehavior when the soldiers aboard are offered the opportunity for shore leave. You are to investigate these rumors and report your findings to me. You are not to act without orders. Understood?”

“Yes, sir.”

“You and your chosen partner will be briefed tomorrow morning at 0800. Dismissed.”

“Sir!” Romero snapped a smart salute, then turned and marched out the door. Harwell allowed himself a small smile. Yes… the girl had promise. This mission would determine whether she was deserving of the promotion he was considering.

 

\---

 

_**SEVEN YEARS LATER** _

“Harwell.”

“Romero,” Harwell greeted his partner with a smile. “And you brought coffee.”

“It’s not yours, old man,” Emmaline informed him, grinning and dancing away, out of reach. She sipped at her own cup, eyes sparkling. “Got to soften up the witness somehow.”

“Just undo a couple of buttons,” Harwell suggested, waggling his eyebrows. “More effective than coffee, and the ‘old man’ still gets his cup.”

“Never going to happen.” She gave him the other cup of coffee anyway. She always did.

Something glinted in his peripheral vision. Just over two decades of combat experience told him everything he needed to know. “Sniper!” he barked, shoving Romero to the ground. He followed too - an instant too late. The round ripped straight through the Kevlar he wore beneath his uniform. A half-second later, there was a _CRACK-BOOM_. The familiar report of a sniper rifle.

 

\---

 

“He was dead before he hit the ground,” a paramedic explained.

Emma just nodded, numb. Her partner, her mentor, her _best friend_ … dead. Just like that. One second he was joking with her, and the next…

“He wouldn’t have felt anything.”

That just made it worse. It made her _angry_. Whoever did this, she would hunt them down, and they would pay. Unfortunately she knew all too well that while she was in charge of the company, she still had higher-ups. She was going to have to go along with any missions she was given. Delegating everything to the company and doing nothing herself wouldn’t go down too well with the brass.

“They’ll pay for this,” she said matter-of-factly.

The brass would pull her off this case. That didn’t mean she didn’t fully intend to keep investigating. Orders or not, someone had killed Tanner fucking Harwell, and she wasn’t going to just let that slide.

 

 

**Author's Note:**

> Contingency: Foxtrot Tango Sierra, or FTS in the NATO phonetic alphabet, was named by a Cadet from the early 2500s. 'FTS' stands for 'fuck this shit', and is basically an evacuation plan, to be executed in the event of a situation in which there is no chain of command and no way to organise a solid defence. Usually only invoked by cadets and inexperienced soldiers in such situations, it involves rallying at the nearest evac point and calling for dustoff. In this fic, though it was invoked a little prematurely, it was most certainly called for, with only one squad of Cadets making it to the rally point, and just six of them surviving long enough to be evacuated.
> 
> This was written to explore backstory and develop a character who was already dead when he was first mentioned in a long-running roleplay I have with someone who isn't on AO3. His protege/partner is only a little more developed.
> 
> I've done my best to keep comms chatter as realistic as possible, while hopefully still getting across the fact that these kids were KIDS when CMA was hit.
> 
> First Lieutenant Emmaline Romero is young, but not unrealistically so. She started with a Cadetship at sixteen, then went from there to the Officer Training Academy at eighteen, blitzing through every course. By eighteen and a half she was a Second Lieutenant and before she turned nineteen, had secured herself a solid place as Major Harwell's favorite. With a little help from said favoritism, she proved her merit quickly, but was to plateau at Major rank for the rest of her career due to her somewhat loose attitude regarding regulations earning her a reputation as a bit of a maverick.


End file.
